Phillips, Power Pace Bats To 10-2 Victory

Louisville Bats starting pitcher Connor Phillips was dominant over six scoreless innings and the offense provided more than enough support, led by a pair of home runs from Davis Wendzel to cruise to a 10-2 victory over the Jacksonville Jumbo Shrimp on Wednesday night at Louisville Slugger Field.

Phillips got off to a solid start with a clean top of the first. The Louisville offense attacked Jacksonville starter Adam Mazur immediately in the bottom half. Edwin Rios kept the inning going with a two-out walk. Wendzel followed by connecting on a towering 397-foot home run down the left field line, his first as a Bat and seventh of the season, to give the home team a 2-0 advantage.

A two-out single and a walk didn’t deter Phillips in the second, as he induced a pop out from Dalvy Rosario to strand the runners. The Bats offense then broke the game open. Ivan Johnson began the inning with an infield single. Eric Yang walked to put two on, and Erik Gonzalez cashed in with a sharp RBI single to center. Jacob Hurtubise then lined a double down the right field line to bring Yang home. Rios capped the inning’s scoring with a two-run single right back up the middle, giving the Bats a 6-0 lead after just two innings.

The second inning was Mazur’s (L, 2-2) last. He was rocked for six runs on six hits, walking four and striking out one to suffer the loss.

Pitching with the lead, Phillips was in cruise control in the middle innings. He induced three fly outs in a quick third inning, three ground outs in a one, two, three fourth. In the fifth, Phillips mixed it up with a strikeout and two pop outs. A double and a walk gave the Jumbo Shrimp a chance to get on the board in the sixth, but Phillips ended the threat by striking out Agustin Rodriguez to wrap up a brilliant outing.

In his best start of the season, Phillips (W, 3-8) threw six scoreless innings, striking out four while allowing four hits and walking two to pick up the victory and snap a streak of six consecutive starts with a loss.

Lyon Richardson was first out of the Louisville bullpen and got an inning-ending double play to erase a leadoff single. Wendzel tacked on with his second home run of the night, a 367-foot shot over the left field fence, giving the Bats a seven-run lead after seven.

Jacksonville got a couple runs in the eighth to get on the board against Evan Kravetz. Rios put the icing on the cake for the Bats in the bottom half, crushing a 428-foot three-run home run to dead center, his team-leading 15^th of the season, to get the Bats into double digits at 10-2. In the ninth, Reiver Sanmartin wrapped up the victory with a clean inning.

All nine Louisville starters reached with either a walk or a hit. Eight of the nine recorded at least one hit. Wendzel went 2-for-5 with the pair of home runs while Rios was 2-for-4, homering and driving in a season-high five runs as the Bats reached double digits in runs for the first time since August 1 at Scranton/Wilkes-Barre.

The Bats (59-74, 21-38 second half) and Jumbo Shrimp (64-68, 29-28 second half) continue the series on Thursday night at Louisville Slugger Field. First pitch is scheduled for 6:35 p.m. Nick Curran and Jim Kelch will be on the call for 1450/96.1 WXVW.